Highs and Lows: Day 3 at the Worlds

Last night was one of those evenings that everyone experiences in high level competitive arenas.  The highs were high and the lows were low.  Dealing with the roller coaster of emotions is something you must learn to take in stride otherwise sports will eat you alive.

Team USA had an overall impressive performance on day 3 of the tournament finally winning some medals.  Jordan Burroughs won his third consecutive gold medal and improved his undefeated winning streak to 65 international matches.  Alyssa earned her second straight bronze medal and Vicki finished 5^th (in her first senior world championships up a weight class).  The results on paper don’t tell the entire story.

The 3^rd consecutive gold medal by Burroughs is one of the greatest feats in American wrestling history.  Knowing he did it on a broken ankle makes it legendary.  Rumors were flying over the past few weeks that he hurt his ankle during training, but no one knew how badly.  We did a short morning workout outside of the hotel and Burroughs’s fiancé hung around and watched.  She shared with us that Jordan had broken his ankle, had surgery on it and now has five screws and a plate.  She said it was a “God healing.”  Knowing this bit of information, it was plain for me to see that he adjusted his entire style throughout the day and turned out one of the guttiest performances I have ever seen.  The highs were really high.

And for the lows…Vicki finishing 5^th in the world is no small feat.  It’s a great accomplishment added to a lengthy resume.  With that said, it doesn’t feel right at the moment.  She was ahead 6-0 in the semi-finals and working towards securing a place in the championship finals, which would have guaranteed her no less than a silver medal, when one miniscule mental break turned into a catastrophe.  She was caught and pinned by her Mongolian opponent and knocked back into a 3^rd place bout and was defeated by a tough North Korean wrestler.  It was crushing and a $25,000 error (the Living the Dream medal fund awards $10,000 to US athletes who earn a bronze medal, $25,000 for silver and $50,000 for gold in non-Olympic years).  Ouch!

Today is a new day, though.  I’m sure there will be highs and lows; there always is.  It’s wrestling.  We have a great line-up competing on this, the fourth day of the event.  Helen Maroulis, Alli Ragan and Elena Pirozkova.  We’re “expecting great success” today – that’s how the Eastern Europeans say it in English.  Helen won a silver medal last year and Elena won a gold medal, so we have our strongest group on the mat.  Tomorrow we finish as a team with Veronica Carlson and Adeline Gray.

If you’ve read previous posts of mine, especially those from wrestling events, you know that Helen is near and dear to us.  She’s that once-in-a-lifetime athlete coaches talk about.  It happens to be her birthday, too.  Fittingly, she shares her special day with Isaiah, who turns 5 today.   What makes it great, though, is she knows it’s not her day.  It belongs to God.  ALL this for a KING!